Using mobile-based Customer Relationship Management (CRM), warranty management, service and spare parts procurement strategies, small and mid-sized organizations can level the playing field with the big boys. What smaller competitors lack in breadth they can make up for in speed and responsiveness.

Gartner’s IT Market Clock for Enterprise Mobility, 2012 captures how mobility is changing the nature of competition.

The demand for mobile transactions is gaining speed. Global mobile transactions predicted to be USD $241 billion in 2011, growing to more than $1 trillion by 2015. New technologies and alliances are emerging. Mobile-payment solutions such as Google Wallet and Apple’s embedded NFC (near field communication) payment system is the first step.

Google recently launched its mobile payments technology, Google Wallet. The idea is to replace credit cards with phones containing a special chip that can be tapped against readers at cash tills in shops to make payments.

The technology has been on trial in New York and San Francisco since May with about 1,000 employees of Google and its partners in the venture, including MasterCard and Macy's department store.

Anyone with a Sprint Nexus S phone, which runs on Google's Android operating system, will be able to use their phones to make payments. Customers will have to sign up for a Citi MasterCard account or get a Google Prepaid Card.

Google Wallet will be marketed in the US only, although the pre-paid card will work internationally. It can be used at any of the 300,000 shops and other outlets in the US and internationally that accept MasterCard PayPass.

Lowe’s has purchased 42,000 iPhones in order to implement a payment system similar to the EasyPay system used at Apple Retail Stores.

Each Lowe’s store will receive 25 iPhones to use for processing payments and answering customer questions. Lowe’s will also be rolling out a web app that will allow customers to use their smartphone to look up product and warranty information.

The new payment devices will presumably feature a barcode scanner and a custom app to interface with the Lowe’s retail system. While Lowe’s isn’t the first to make the switch to this type of payment method, having been beat to the punch by their competitor Home Depot and other major retailers, it’s still refreshing to see that even hardware stores cannot resist the allure of iDevices.